by Julie Kagawa
“Always a catch,” I sighed, and crossed my arms. “Let’s hear it.”
“Just this. If someone asks where you got such a treasure, tell them you found it at Cricket’s Collectables, your one stop for the most unique items in the Iron Realm and beyond.”
“That’s it?” I said, dubious and surprised. Tokens were valuable, and the bargain to get one was usually a lot more than that. “No, seriously. I was expecting at least a lock of hair. It’s never that easy. What’s in it for you?”
“Lock of hair?” She gave a high-pitched giggle. “Oh, you oldbloods are so old-fashioned. It’s called word of mouth, silly. Free marketing! If the famous Robin Goodfellow, friend of queens and hero of the Nevernever, recommends my shop to anyone, that alone is worth a dozen bargains. No strings, no fine print, this is just business. So...” She held the Joker out once again, waggling the card in an enticing manner. “Do we have a deal? You know you want it.”
Oh, what the heck? She seemed nice enough, if a bit unhinged. And you only live once.
“Deal,” I said, and snatched the card out of her fingers before she could add anything else. “Not that I need the luck, but more is always good, right?”
She beamed. “Pleasure doing business with you, Robin Goodfellow,” she exclaimed, and took a step back. “Don’t forget, if anyone asks about that Token, point them to Cricket’s Collectables. You have a good night now.” She lifted a hand in a wave, then turned and walked back to her stall, followed by the little terrier and eventually the two big dogs.
Man, easiest goblin market deal I’ve made yet. Free word of mouth, huh? Maybe she’s onto something, after all.
I grinned, stuck the card in a pocket, and went looking for a cloaked faery king.
He waited for me on the other side of the massive wheel as he’d promised, hood pushed back, face no longer hidden in shadow. The moonlight caught in his silver hair, which was longer than I’d seen it last and pulled into a tail behind him. Tall and lean, he stood motionless, watching me approach, and though his face was young, the set of his jaw and the grimness in his eyes made him appear much older. He was dressed completely in black, down to his boots and gloves, the shadowy cloak rippling around him. Except for his pointed ears, he would’ve given a vampire a run for its money.
And though I hated to admit it, it suited him.
I wished it didn’t. I remembered a time when he had smiled easily, when that bright blue gaze could charm a manticore, when he would listen, wide-eyed, as I told him stories about my greatest adventures in the Nevernever and beyond. I’d watched him grow up, watched as he developed the best, and worst, parts of both his parents—his mother’s kindness and empathy, his father’s courage and warrior spirit. And the mile-wide stubborn streak of them both. But I’d also seen that hint of darkness within that not even his parents had noticed, had watched it grow and fester until, eventually, it had swallowed him whole, and he’d turned into something no one recognized. A threat to the entire Nevernever.
Thankfully, with the help of his family and a certain infamous trickster, he had been able to drag himself out of the darkness, back into the light. But as was always the case when one returned from the void, he wasn’t quite the same. Tragedy had marked him, and the taint lingered. For his crimes against Faery, he’d been banished from the Nevernever and forbidden to return to the place of his birth. Now, he lived in a place called the Between, the veil between Faery and the mortal world, with the shadowy fey called the Forgotten.
I worried for him. Despite everything he’d done, he was still a good kid, wanting to redeem himself for the crimes of his past. But I saw that hint of darkness in the shadows that clung to his skin and curled around him like grasping claws. He reminded me of another faery who, at a time when rage and despair had driven his every decision, had turned on his former best friend and tried to destroy him. I saw hints of that grief in the faery before me now. He was very much like his father.
Keirran, son of the Iron Queen, former prince of the Iron Court and King of the Forgotten, faced me calmly in the shadows cast by the Ferris wheel.
“Princeling,” I greeted as I sauntered up. “Fancy meeting you here. Aren’t you supposed to be in the Between ruling a court or something? Are the Forgotten driving you crazy, or did you just get bored?”
“I’ve been trying to get a message to Mag Tuiredh,” Keirran replied, all businesslike and serious. “But the normal ways haven’t been working. The gremlin messengers disappear—they never make it to the Iron Realm.”
“Gremlins are flighty and easily distracted at the best of times,” I pointed out. “You sure they didn’t just see a chicken or a rock and forget what they were doing?”
Keirran frowned. “I’ve always been able to get the gremlins to listen to me, even before I became the Forgotten King,” he replied. “There’s no shortage of them in the mortal world, and they’ve always obeyed me before. At least one of them should have made it.”
“What about Furball?”
“I sent out a request for Grimalkin, but he hasn’t answered.” Keirran shook his head with another frown. “Of course, Grimalkin will come only if he feels like it, and he’s decided not to show. I’m running out of options. Since I can’t go into the Nevernever myself, I figured I would come here to try to get a message to the Iron Court.”
I narrowed my eyes. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Keirran. I believed he was trying his best to do right, to make up for his past. But he ruled a creepy land shrouded in mist and darkness, with faeries that sucked the glamour out of other fey because they had none of their own. That would put a strain on even the most levelheaded faery, and with his amount of power, a stressed-out Keirran was no good for anyone.
“Is there something going on we should know about, princeling?” I asked. “Are you in trouble again?”
“No. I’m not in any trouble, but...” Keirran hesitated, a slight furrow creasing his brow. “Something strange is happening in the Between,” he admitted. “There have been...incidents, with the Forgotten. Violent incidents, which is not like them at all. And the Between itself is... It doesn’t feel right, if that makes any sense.” He sighed, sounding frustrated and, for a moment, looking years younger. “I don’t know what’s going on, and that worries me,” he muttered. “I was hoping Mom or someone from the Iron Court would be able to help. I certainly can’t bring my concerns to Summer or Winter.”
“Yeah, that would probably be a bad idea.”
While the rulers of the Seelie and Unseelie courts didn’t exactly hate Keirran—well, except Titania, but she hated everyone—they were old-fashioned and stuck in their ways, and if a problem didn’t affect their own territories, they were content to do nothing about it. And if it did affect their own territories, their answer was usually to eradicate the problem, swiftly and with lots of pointy, stabby things, before it could become a threat. Though Keirran was very begrudgingly accepted as a ruler of a court, the fey tended to fear and despise anything new. Both the Forgotten and Meghan’s own subjects, the Iron fey, had struggled with that.
The Forgotten King scrubbed a hand over his hair in an eerily familiar way. He was so much like a mini Ash it almost hurt. “I don’t know if I’m being paranoid,” he said. “It’s my realm, I should be able to take care of this myself. I don’t want to bother the monarchs of the other courts if it’s not important. But...” His eyes narrowed. “I guess you should know the real reason I came. The Forgotten aren’t acting normal, and...there is this thing out there, stalking them through the Between.”
“A ‘thing’?” I blinked. “Uh, can you be a little more specific, princeling? What type of thing? Are we talking haunted toothbrush, evil mushroom person, carnivorous house? Maybe a sadistic potted plant? Tell me if I’m getting close.”
“I don’t know.” Keirran’s eyes went unfocused. “It was like a living shadow, almost insubstantial, but the way it moved
was just wrong. Maybe it’s a new type of Forgotten, but it was like nothing I’d seen before. And it emanated...pure loathing.” He shuddered, looking grim. “I could feel this thing’s hatred. As if it despised everything and wanted all of us dead. Not just me and the Forgotten—everyone. All living creatures, in the Between, the Nevernever, and the mortal world.”
“Well, that isn’t very nice. It doesn’t even know me.”
Keirran shook his head. “I encountered it once before, after I returned from Ethan and Kenzie’s wedding,” he went on, naming the Iron Queen’s recently married brother and his princess. “I thought I killed it, but either it’s back, or there’s more than one.” He hesitated, then continued in a grim voice, “I think it’s the reason the Forgotten have been acting strangely. This thing, whatever it is, radiates loathing. And the Forgotten have no glamour of their own, so...”
“They suck it up like a sponge.” I whistled softly. That did sound serious. Definitely something that needed checking out. “Well, I’m no monarch of Mag Tuiredh,” I went on, “but I have been lots of places, all over the world, really. And I’ve seen a lot of weird stuff, both in Faery and the mortal realm. So, here’s a solution—why don’t I go back with you to the Between? We’ll just have a quick lookie-loo, see if we can’t find this ‘I hate everyone and their dog’ thing, and determine if it’s something Meghan and the courts need to worry about. But I doubt it. I mean, you’re the Forgotten King, and I’m the one and only Robin Goodfellow. Between the two of us, we should be able to handle anything.”
There was a tiny prickle of warning in the back of my mind. How many times had I said those exact words to Ash, back when the two of us thought we could take on the entire Nevernever? How many times had we ended up in way over our heads, facing dragons and monster swarms and ancient, powerful guardians trying to crush us as we struggled to survive and escape? More times than I could count. Now I was saying it to Ash’s son, who had already turned the Nevernever upside down with his antics. Who was very much like his father, but without the centuries of fighting skills and lived experience to back him up. I wondered if it was destiny or a very bad omen that we’d both come here tonight.
Ah, it’ll be fine. This is Meghan and Ash’s kid, after all. What’s the worst that could happen?
The Forgotten King considered it. “Maybe that’s for the best,” he mused. “If the two of us can keep this contained, it would be better not to involve the rest of the courts. And if it is something we can’t handle, at least you can go back to warn everyone. All right.” He nodded decisively. “It’s settled, then. Puck, if you would accompany me back to the Between, I would appreciate it.”
“No problem, princeling.” I grinned, rubbing my hands together. “It’s been a while since I’ve been on a decent adventure. A trek into the Between sounds fun.”
Keirran lifted his chin, looking like he was going to comment on that. But before he could say anything, a scream echoed beyond the Ferris wheel, and angry voices rose into the night.
2
NYX
Keirran and I exchanged a glance. In the shadows of the Ferris wheel, the Forgotten King’s expression was impassive.
“Uh, you didn’t come here with a mob of angry trolls on your heels, did you, princeling?” I asked.
The shadow of a smirk crossed his face. “I was about to ask you the same,” he said dryly. “Apparently, there are rumors that a few thousand wild geese somehow appearing in Queen Titania’s throne room this summer was not entirely a fluke of nature.”
“Touché.” I grinned back at him. “Not that I would confess to anything about that incident, but man, geese are loud. You could hear them honking for miles. Well, then.” I dusted imaginary dirt from my hands and turned toward the direction of the shouting. “I guess we should go see what’s up.”
Together, we walked across the fairgrounds toward the distant hubbub. As we drew closer, the voices got louder and angrier, though any actual words were blown away on the breeze. Whoever they were, I hoped it wasn’t an angry mob looking for Keirran, or me. Hard as it was to believe, there were creatures out there who didn’t like me that much. Titania herself sicced her hounds on me at least once a year. You couldn’t be the World’s Greatest Prankster and not have people wanting to kill you all the time.
We were nearly to the carousel, tents and booths lining the walkway again, when the tenor of the voices changed. A bloodthirsty howl rose into the night, indicating something had gotten tired of words and switched to violence. More voices echoed the call for blood as rushing footsteps and snarls of rage indicated the fight had finally broken out.
Keirran and I sprinted the final paces around the carousel and found the ruckus.
A crowd of a couple dozen fey, eyes hard and lips curled in shouts or snarls, clustered in a loose half circle around a wagon. Most of them were Unseelie: redcaps, goblins, and a few Winter sidhe that held themselves apart from the “lesser” fey. But I saw a handful of Seelie scattered throughout the throng as well. Marla, the gnome, stood at the edge of the mob, her wrinkled face pulled into an ugly scowl as she shook a fist at what was happening in the center of the circle.
A group of four redcaps—think evil gnomes with jagged shark teeth and a hat drenched in the blood of their victims—surrounded a figure a few paces from the wagon steps. The figure’s back was to us, so I couldn’t see its face, and a hooded gray cloak hid the rest of its body, but each of its hands, slightly raised from its sides, gripped a curved, shining blade. My eyes were drawn to those blades. They glowed silver-white in the darkness and didn’t appear quite solid, as if the figure was brandishing two razor-thin shafts of moonlight.
Whatever they were made of, they were definitely sharp enough to do the job. A pair of redcaps lay writhing in the dust at the stranger’s feet, blood streaming from identical hair-thin gashes across their throats. As I watched, the bodies rippled, then dissolved into piles of squirming slugs and worms as the bloodthirsty faeries died in the manner of all fey and simply ceased to exist.
The rest of the motley snarled, baring their fangs, but seemed reluctant to fling themselves on the stranger’s blades of light. Around them, the crowd roared, perched on the edge of devolving into utter pandemonium.
“Enough!”
I jumped as the booming voice rang in my ear and shook the struts of the carousel. Startled, I paused, and Keirran strode past me toward the mob, power snapping around him like a cloak. Overhead, lightning flickered, and ice spread out from his boots as he walked, coating the ground with tiny crystal daggers.
Eyes wide with fear and recognition, the throng cringed away from the Forgotten King as he stopped in the center of the circle. The redcaps hissed and scuttled back into the crowd, and the rest of the mob shuffled nervously, averting their gazes. Keirran might be the newest ruler of Faery, a mere child to most, but he possessed a special talent that none in the Nevernever could boast: the ability to wield all three glamours, Summer, Winter, and Iron.
“What is the meaning of this?” Keirran’s voice was back to its normal calm, but there was no mistaking the steely edge beneath. “Have you all lost your minds? The goblin market is neutral ground. All fey are welcome here, even those of the Iron Court. Explain yourselves.”
“Forgotten King.” A Winter sidhe, tall and draped in a robe adorned in colored icicles, stepped forward. The icicles jingled like chimes as he raised an arm, pointing a long finger at the cloaked figure. “This creature came into the market and was clearly dangerous,” he accused, his voice high and haughty. “We thought the threat should be eliminated.”
“It attacked every one of you?” Keirran’s voice was just the right mix of skeptical and mocking. “It came to the goblin market with the sole purpose of starting a war? How very ambitious. Perhaps we should ask how it intended to accomplish such a thing.” He shot a glance at the figure standing motionless beside him. “What say you, stranger?
This lot accuses you of single-handedly trying to slaughter them all. What is your side of things?”
“Nothing quite so interesting, Your Majesty.” I blinked at the voice. Lilting, confident, and as wryly amused as Keirran. Also, definitely female. “I came to the goblin market searching for someone. Apparently, stopping to ask for directions is a crime worthy of death in this era, though it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. At least I found whom I was looking for.”
She raised her head, gazing directly at the Forgotten King, and Keirran stiffened. Not noticeably; he hid his surprise quite well. But I saw the flash of recognition and shock in his eyes, and my own curiosity flared.
“Well, then.” I stepped from the carousel’s shadow and strode to the middle of the circle, beaming my brightest smile at the crowd of fearful, angry faces. “Obviously this has been a giant misunderstanding,” I said loudly, “one we can all put behind us and forget about. I’m sure that’s what we want, right? I’m sure nobody here wants to explain to the courts why the entire goblin market suddenly exploded in a rain of fire, blood, lightning, and frogs. Why frogs, you ask? Well, that’s what happened the last time the goblin market tried to put an end to a certain Summer jester. Nothing but frogs as far as the eye could see.” I found the gazes of the redcaps and the Winter sidhe. “It was so epic, the humans in the mortal world still talk about it. But I don’t see any reason that it should happen again, right?”
“Robin Goodfellow is here, too?”
I didn’t see the speaker, but at least half the crowd cringed back even farther. The Winter sidhe with the tinkling coat shot me a glare of absolute loathing, but I saw fear on that pale, haughty face as well. The redcap motley peeking out of the crowd cast furious gazes between me and the cloaked stranger, but this mob was done. No faery in their right mind would pick a fight with the Forgotten King and Robin Goodfellow, and after a tense silence, the Winter sidhe gathered up his robe and stalked off in a huff, cheerful jingles following his exit. The rest of the throng dissipated quickly, with only Marla giving me a pinched, disappointed look, before she, too, vanished into the market, leaving Keirran and me alone with the stranger.